Thomas Duffy is the Barbara Jacobs Chair of Education and Technology at Indiana University and the founding director of the Center for Research on Learning and Technology. He is a professor in instructional systems technology and the cognitive science program.

Duffy took a two year leave of absence from Indiana to work with Unext's Cardean University where he was a vice-president and chief learning officer at Unext and the provost of Cardean University. His responsibilities included designing and evaluating the MBA courses and developing the academic policy. Prior to Indiana University, Duffy was a professor of English and psychology and directed the Communication Design Center at Carnegie Mellon University.

Duffy's academic career has been dedicated to exploring the design and use of information in education and the workplace. He has published over 100 papers on learning, performance, and technology. He has written or edited several books, including Online Help: Design and Evaluation, Constructivism and The Technology of Instruction: A Conversation, Designing Constructivist Learning Environments, and most recently, New Learning with R.J. Simons and Jos van der Linden. He is co-editing a new book that is in development, Learning theory and the design of Distance Education: Case Studies.

Duffy earned his PhD in cognitive psychology from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.